Tag Archives: food

Chocolate

Chocolate: (n) a food preparation made from roasted and ground cacao seeds, typically sweetened.

Obesity is a bitch, because it bitches at you because you’re obese.

It forces you to think about food more than you need to, which can eventually cause you to rebel about being confined.

After all, I’ve never seen a prisoner who’s grateful for being locked up because it made him eat more vegetables.

Likewise, even though being fat does require some disciplinary action, removing the finer parts of life–for instance, chocolate– is what the constitution may have meant by “cruel and unusual punishment.”

So sometimes the prisoner locked within the fatty walls must break out and be free.

Matter of fact, it happened to me last night.

I wanted some chocolate.

Realizing that a Milky Way candy bar is in the hundreds of calories, and even a pack of M & M’s has way too much sugar, I did discover a tiny piece of delight called the Candy Kiss, which ended up being just 22 calories and 2.6 grams of sugar.

Now obviously, one Candy Kiss is not enough, especially if you’ve been locked up in solitary for a long period of time, devoid of the pleasure. But sometimes you can convince yourself to hold it to three.

Three Candy Kisses, bitten in half, creating six bites of chocolate, is a mind-boggling, soul-altering spiritual revival, with a good shout of “Hallelujah” followed by a creamy “A-men.”

Sometimes nothing will replace chocolate.

I certainly enjoy my asparagus, but I cannot truthfully say that it is related, coordinated, conjoined or entwined with the marvelous miracle of chocolate.

 

 

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Broth

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Broth: (n) soup consisting of meat or vegetable chunks, and often rice, cooked in stock.

Although it may seem bewildering, it is one of my fondest memories.

I was in the midst of one of my festering needs to lose weight and had fasted for about a day-and-a-half (though at the time I would have insisted it was two).Dictionary B

I was hungry.

You see, as a fat man, I never allow myself to become hungry. The presence of food is the ushering in of appetite.

I’ve never been able to consider the consumption of calories to be nutrition for survival, but rather, a pleasure I grant myself in large quantities, to confirm that I have the power to relish what is available.

Bluntly, I’m never starved. I just eat.

On this particular occasion, though, I actually gained the pangs, the passion and the purpose to receive food.

My body was growing weaker and weaker, and threatened to shut down in protest over my abstinence from meals.

Yet there was a thirty-minute passage of time when I felt more alive than I had ever felt before. I needed something–and was fully aware that I was about to receive it.

I was really famished.

I sensed a yearning rather than a burning.

And when I sat down at the end of that half-an-hour, to steaming broth with floating pieces of carrot and rice, smelling of chicken, I will tell you it was probably the most delicious delicacy I have ever devoured.

It had fragrance, taste and promise.

I’ve often wondered why I can’t return to that same fervency of appreciation.

Because on that day, a bowl of broth tasted to me like heavenly manna.

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Bran

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Bran: (n) pieces of grain husk separated from flour after milling

I’m sorry to admit that I’ve reached an age when, for some reason or another, I feel comfortable to discuss my bowel movements in public.

Not with everybody.Dictionary B

There has to be some intimacy that’s been exchanged between us in order for me to uncork information on my flow.

I used to go to the toilet without reservation or comment. Often it happened too quickly or too frequently, but I always felt like I was just a “regular guy.”

Then suddenly the large and small intestine became territorial–perhaps because for many years they had been in competition with each other over size.

So the food I now place in my mouth has become like a reluctant old man who has found his favorite park bench and believes there are squirrels yet unfed.

It has become necessary for me to introduce bran–usually in the form of cereal–for my breakfast, without allowing it to look like I have done so because I have been overtaken by a cloud of decrepit.

Especially when I get around my children or younger humans, I will lamely attempt to offer the possibility that the cereal is to my liking and I would choose it over Lucky Charms any day.

Yet I can see it in their eyes–a mingling of mischief and pity which lets me know that they are aware that this consumption of bran products is necessary to unclog my dam.

Oh, damn.

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Bowl

Bowl: (n) a round, deep dish or basin used for food or liquid.

“Just give me a small bowl of ice cream.”Dictionary B

I’ve said that many times.

Or maybe it was a small bowl of spaghetti, popcorn, candy or some other notorious treat.

My friends understand what I mean by a small bowl. It isn’t one of those little three-finger types that you use for mints at a party, yet it’s not one of those huge Tupperware varieties occasionally employed for displaying fruit.

Even in the realm of cereal bowls, there’s quite a variety of renditions:

  • There’s the cereal bowl suited for a small child
  • The teenager
  • And then me

Yes–my bowl somewhat follows the Goldilocks Theory–it has to be “just right.”

Yet you have to be able to call it a “small bowl” even if it’s very large, so to those listening, you appear to be temperate of the highly caloric treat, so they can testify on your behalf later on when the scales of poundage groan their disagreement.

After all…you just had a small bowl.

 

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Balsamic Vinegar

Balsamic vinegar: (n) dark, sweet Italian vinegar that has been matured in wooden barrels.Dictionary B

I guess it was around age 35 when I stopped trying to be enticed and instead, allowed myself to be convinced.

Up to that point, everything needed to have a sensuality, an obvious value or a pleasure related to it in order to grab my interest.

To put it bluntly, a stick had to come along a poke my lust–whether a lust for food, romance, power or even work–to get me revved up and ready to go.

Yes, I needed to be enticed.

So in that time–those “salad days”–when I ordered a salad, I always got a mix of Thousand Island and Blue Cheese dressing. Why?

  • Because I loved the taste.
  • I loved the rich, thick texture.
  • And I think, secretly, I was enthralled by the number of calories.

But then when I reached 35, I started thinking about my mortality. Death is highly unlikely when you’re a kid. But death lurks in your late thirties, and even though it’s not prominent, it is still evident.

It was at that point that I realized my choice of salad dressings was contrary to my good health. So I investigated other choices.

The one suggested to me more often than any other was balsamic vinegar. “Low in calories, good for your tummy and a promoter of excellent digestion.”

When I tasted it, I wanted to run out of the room. It was not creamy. It was not delicious. It was intrusive. Yes, that’s the word.

But since I was trying to move out of a climate of enticement, I allowed myself to be convinced that this dressing was to my betterment.

To this day, when I go to a restaurant and they don’t have lower calorie options, I will order it–not because it’s enticing, but because I finally am convinced.

 

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